Radio Metropole: A station in Haiti running out of steam

Radio Metropole’s
journalists, coping in a tent set up in the garden of the radio station’s
office in Port-au-Prince,
have not still resumed their normal pace of work because of the trauma caused
by the January 12 earthquake. The station resumed its normal programming on
February 1, after broadcasting news via the Internet for two weeks.

Richard Widmaer, the director general of Radio Metropole,
said there were no deaths or injuries to his staff. The building suffered minor
damage and the equipment is still usable, he said. However, he indicated that
most of the station’s journalists currently have no fixed address. They have
lost virtually everything and are facing enormous difficulties. One of them
even lost his wife in the disaster, he said.

“We have resumed our activities, but at what cost?” Widmaer
wondered, saying that the financial situation of the radio station is so
precarious that it will be difficult to find money to pay employees. Radio
Metropole, he said, is an exclusively commercial enterprise and depends on
advertising revenues. Of about 50 partners who used to advertise with his
station, only 10 have maintained their commitment and for a period of just one
week, he said, arguing that after operating for one month in such stagnation,
there is a real, frightening possibility he would need to reduce the newsroom
staff by half.

The damage to
the business and banking sector in Port-au-Prince,
the Haitian capital, has seriously affected commercial radio stations. Along
with his colleagues from the National Association of Haitian Media, Widmaer
plans to issue an overall assessment report on the status of the private media
following the disaster. This assessment, he said, will consider the huge loss
in terms of buildings and equipment.

Radio
Metropole, which has been on the air in Port-au-Prince
since 1970, was the first radio station to broadcast on the FM band in the area.
Other short-wave (AM) stations switched to FM frequency after that.

The
reconstruction of commercial radio stations should be part of the overall
reconstruction plan of the capital, Widmaer said, noting that such stations
cover about 80 percent of the media landscape in Haiti. He said he believes a
Marshall Plan for the media is necessary, otherwise outlets could disappear.

Editor’s Note:If you have any information on journalists and media outlets in Haitiplease post a comment below or notify us via e-mail [email protected], or Twitter: @HelpJournalists. We are collecting funds that will go directly to Haitian journalists. If you’d like to make a contribution, please click this link and enter “Haiti” in the “Notes” section on the second page.

Jean Roland Chery, a Haitain journalist now living in the United States, has served as CPJ’s consultant to Haiti. He wrote extensively on the 2010 earthquake.